Reality Bites
by ShaiBrooklyn
Summary: What happens when you and your best friend have a one night stand before he leaves for Afghanistan? AU with elements of the show.
1. Chapter 1

2006:

"You know I'm leaving in a week?" Nick said quietly as Andy sat across from him on the floor of her room. "I know…" she responded her eyes locked on her hands as she stared at her shoes. "I just wish…" he said as he pulled her into his lap. "I just wish I'd realized sooner that I had a home here, with you and I wouldn't be going. You know I'm going to write you every day?" She nodded into his chest not wanting to allow herself to catch her breath.

Nick and Andy had been best friends their entire lives. Both from broken homes, neither really knowing what a family was. Andy was raised by her drunken retired Cop father and Nick was raised by his absent aunt after his parents where killed in a car crash when he was nine. They'd been inseparable as friends all through school and where planning on moving into an apartment together until Nick's aunt passed and he lost everything. He had nowhere to go, no money he was just kind of floating along with Andy. Doing the only think he felt he could do he enlisted in the service and was shipping off the basic training at the end of the week.

The thing that worked with their friendship is that it was just that, a great friendship. They never looked at each other as anything more. Until it was time for him to leave and Andy realized in 72 hours he'd be across the country and gone for God knew how long with no contact leaving her here, alone.

She turned in his lap to face him and pulled his face close to hers. Without a hesitation she pulled him into a kiss, his arms wrapped around her holding her as close as he possibly could. "We can't do this…not now…" he said as he moved his hands to her waist. Ignoring him she started softly kissing his jawline, his lower ear and down the side of his neck. Nick let out a soft moan as he realized he didn't want to stop, and he fully welcomed what happened next.

A few hours later Andy woke up, she let her eyes adjust to the dark and remembered she was completely naked and in Nick's arms. They'd moved to her bed, trying to avoid making too much noise. She pulled his arms closer to her and relished in his warmth before she heard him stir. "Hey," he said as she rolled over and her eyes met his. "Yeah that wasn't planned." He laughed. "Sorry about that, but I must admit those cheerleaders seem to have taught you a thing or two!" Andy's smile was infectious and Nick let himself get lost in her eyes. "Seriously though, where does this put us?" he asked, his face changing as the magnitude of what had happened finally registered. "We stay open with us, and we live in the moment. We have two days to just be here with each other" Andy responded burying her face in his chest as he pulled her closer.

Those two days passed, they never left her room except to get the occasional meal. Her father was at his latest attempt at rehab, so they were never disturbed. It was so much more than the sex, they laid with each other reading, watching movies and writing down their favorite memories growing up. Anything to hold on to those moments before it was time for him to leave.

She hugged him as he boarded his plane to basic training, reminding herself that he wasn't leaving forever but also coming to the realization that for the first time in eleven years she had to exist on her own.

After she watched him leave she went home. The place felt nothing like home, it was cold, empty and unwelcoming. When she walked in her dad was sitting at the table with the sports pages open.

"You know you can do better than that kid?" he said without looking up from the paper. Andy set her keys down in the green glass bowl by the door and walked into the kitchen. "Please don't start, not tonight. I'm tired and I really don't feel like fighting with you about how much you think you know about me." She said her back to him as she reached in the refrigerator for some milk. "You will not take that tone with me, I am still your father!" Tommy said as he slammed the paper down. "This is still my house." He continued to shout. Andy let go of the milk in the refrigerator and turned to him. "You have no right, you spend every God Damned day drunk out of your mind. Do you know how many times Nick helped me bring you in the house when you're passed out on the porch, or the stairs? Or how many times he helped get you into the shower to sober you up? Too many! So screw you." She said heatedly. "You haven't been my father since mom left, so don't you dare try to be one now!" she added before storming out of the kitchen.

The next few weeks passed in a daze as Andy spent most of her time working. She'd gotten a job right before Nick left as a bartender to pass continue to save up until she could move out.

The letters. They never came. It was like he vanished, and the longer the time passed the more it hurt. He did the one thing they swore they would never do to each other he broke her heart. She knew he was still alive or at least she'd hoped he was and before long the hurt turned to pain and pain to anger. She missed him.

Nick had been gone for a month and she hadn't heard from him at all. Stepping out of the shower Andy wrapped her towel around her and stood in front of her bathroom mirror. She signed heavily as she stared at her reflection. "Things aren't going to change on there own you know?" she said to herself as she opened her medicine cabinet. She reached for her facial toner and her hand brushed past the box of tampons. "Shit…" she sad under her breath as reality smacked her right in the face. Grabbing her towel tighter she scrambled to her room grabbing her calendar. Sure enough she was three weeks late.

_**I don't write...at all. However thanks to cold medicine and falling asleep to Rookie Blue I cannot get this dream out of my head...lol Reviews, thoughts, total hatred. Please share:)**_


	2. Chapter 2

"COLLINS, MAIL!" Sergeant Sheffield yelled as he tossed Nick a bundle of envelopes. Nick sat upright from his position on his bunk. He'd finished basic and was now in Afghanistan on his first tour. Defending what, he had no clue, but he had an address and a bed and other than Andy that was really all that mattered. He thumbed through the letters noting once again that they were the letters he'd written Andy. He did as he said and wrote to her every single day, sometimes-simple lines, and sometimes many pages reminding her how much he missed her and realizing how much he actually hated being away. Every letter came back; red ink scribbled the words 'Return To Sender' on each envelope. He'd been gone three months, and 63 letters lay in a box under his bunk. He stared blankly at them as he sifted through the box wondering what changed, was she really mad enough that he was gone that she severed ties completely? "Why?" he spoke softly to himself as he pulled a photo of the two of them from the box and folded it putting it in his vest pocket. He'd tried calling the house but the phone never picked up, her cell phone proved unresponsive as well.

Several hours later Nick found himself back in his bunk after spending the better part of the day on the front lines defending camp from a group of insurgents that decided their base was a good place to target. He was covered in sweat, blood and dirt and despite how weathered his body was he sat at his small desk and pulled out a piece of paper.

_Andy,_

_I don't really know where to begin. We were attacked tonight, bullets everywhere, and Andy it was so loud. I couldn't hear anything. We lost two guys and I can still see their faces and the blood, there was so much blood. I held Teniman's hand while he was dying and the look on his face. He kept telling me to tell his wife how much he loved her and I… I just can't get his voice out of my head. I can't stop seeing the life leave his eyes and I can't stop picturing his wife getting that knock on her door. I don't know why I left and I just miss you, I miss us. I miss you kicking my ass at pool after I got off work and I miss the smell of your shampoo and how you feel in my arms and I…I really don't know what else I can say to get you answer me. Just know I'm not going to stop writing. I promised I'd write everyday and I will._

_Andy McNally you're my sanity, you're my escape from this dangerous place I'm in and I love you. _

_-Nick_

Nick stared at the paper as he realized he still had his fellow soldier's blood still on his hand and it had transferred to the paper. His eyes filled with tears as he let the events of the night sink in. The weight building on his shoulder finally broke and he felt the moisture flood his eyes. The situation in Kandahar was getting more deadly as the weeks passed. One lone tear stained the page. He blinked through the tears and set his pen down. He'd accepted death, never feared it but every time he tried to move past the new found cloud that hovered over him he saw Andy's face, standing at a nameless plot with a single marker and it terrified him. Writing to her, jotting down memories from when they were kids, happy times helped get through the nights and function. Nick folded the letter and slid it in an envelope; he addressed it and tucked it into his vest pocket.

Pulling out another sheet of paper he started writing to his sergeant's new widow. He wanted to express to her how he hadn't been alone when he passed and how much he loved her and how he kissed the picture of him and his wife before they went out on patrol every evening. He wanted her to have good memories of her husband, before he realized it he'd filled two pages of goofy stories of the sergeant and a slight smile crept over his face. He got up and grabbed another envelope, folding the letter he put it with his letter to Andy and sat on his bed. He pulled out the picture of him and Andy he kept with him and slid it under his pillow. He finally succumbed to the weight of the day and fell asleep for the first time in months.


	3. Chapter 3

"Are you sure this is OK?" Andy asked as she stepped in to the small house. "It really is no problem. Finn and Leo are about the same age so it will be perfect. My mom will watch Finn with Leo while we are in class." Tracy answered while grabbing Andy's bag from her. Andy surveyed the house. She was finally out of her father's house. Not as soon as she'd hoped but when she found out she was pregnant she knew she had to make a change. Nicholas Finn Collins was passed out in her arms. He was four and a half months old and everything in the world to her. She laid him down on the bed while she set up his play crib. Moving him into it she sat on the edge of the bed watching him as he slept. Her thoughts wandered to when she told her father she was pregnant.

_"Dad, we need to talk." Andy said as she set his plate on the table. She'd been home more than normal as her morning sickness and overall unsteadiness where wearing her down. Nick had been gone for six months and Andy was now six months pregnant. She was getting to where she couldn't hide it anymore; she was starting to show, before because of her athletic build the baby looked more like she'd had a few too many beers. She and her father had grown closer with Nick's absence. Tommy McNally had been sober for six months; he hadn't had a drink after their big blowup when Nick left. Andy sat down and bowed her head for grace. They held hands and said Amen. Andy stared at her plate hoping somewhere in the potatoes she'd find some courage. "Can you pass a roll?" Tommy asked. "Dad, listen to me! I'm… pregnant." She blurted out. Tommy set his fork. "It's his isn't it?" he asked, his eyes never leaving his plate. "It is a boy, and yes it's Nick's." Andy replied softly. "What I say won't matter Andy, you know that and I know you will do everything in your power to not be like me, just know that you will never be like me as a parent. You will always be better, you've already shown that in how you take care of me." Tommy reached across the table and gave her hand a soft squeeze. "Have you told him?" he asked. "I…I haven't heard from him since he left. He just vanished." The words came out barely above a whisper and she could feel her dinner sitting in the back of her throat. "We can do this, you are a strong enough person for anyone!" Tommy said comforting her as he pulled her in to a hug._

The further along Andy got the more she realized bartending wasn't going to cut it and through the last few months she'd grown a new found respect for her father. Andy decided that the best she could do for her and Finn was to join the police force and follow in her father's footsteps. Despite their differences she wanted him to be proud of her and she knew if she managed to get to 15 Division he would be.

"We are Rookies tomorrow!" Tracy said into Andy's room as she caught site of her watching Finn sleep.

Tracy and Andy met at work, Andy had to give up bartending when Finn was born and was working in a small diner. They had a lot in common mostly their kids. Tracy had had Leo when she was in high school and he was going on two years old now. She put herself through school with the help of her mother who would watch Leo while she worked or was in school. Despite becoming closer to her father Andy felt she needed to be on her own, she needed distance between her and her father. Tracy had an empty room and offered it to Andy, it helped because it was closer to the station and she knew Finn would be with someone she could trust.

**Feels like a filler chapter and I'm sorry:( Should be moving along better after this.**


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